


Bonus round 5

by oyogihodai (alder_knight)



Series: SASO 2016 fills [17]
Category: Free!, High☆Speed!
Genre: Curses, Fairy Tale Curses, Fairy Tale Elements, Gen, Genderbending, Magic, Not Beta Read, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rapunzel Elements, Rating May Change, Sleeping Beauty Elements, Snow White Elements, TEMPORARILY ABANDONED, To Be Continued, To Be Edited, Witches, Work In Progress, this is gonna be a wild ride
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-07-28 19:51:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7654450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alder_knight/pseuds/oyogihodai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><a href="http://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/16113.html?thread=7534577#cmt7534577">Prompt</a>: <i>Summer's a time for swapping stories around the campfire. With that in mind, this round draws inspiration from the stories humanity have told each other over the centuries.</i></p><p>  <i>This round does not have prompts. Instead, we ask you to draw inspiration from the wide pool of mythology, fantasy, folklore, and fable. An urban fantasy or supernatural AU? A re-imagining of your favorite folk tale? Characters swapping ghost stories or playing D&D? As long as your fill in some way incorporates the fantastical and/or supernatural, it's welcome here.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Haruka who had hair as dark as ink, cheeks as rosy as cherry blossoms, and eyes as clear as water. She lived in a small fishing village with her mother and her father and a little black dog named Makkou, and she loved to swim.

“Go out and play,” her mother would say, “you can go down to the ocean and collect shells and play in the sand, but don’t go in the water without me. There are jellyfish in the waves.”

When Haruka was only a baby, an old woman had put a curse on her to punish her parents for fishing too close to her hut. It was a tiny structure on tall legs that stood out off the edge of a peninsula, out past the docks of the fishing village, and all of the boats knew not to go there. But Haruka’s mother had been stricken with a hunger during her pregnancy, and more than anything else, she wanted a certain kind of mackerel that shoaled in the shallows near the old woman’s hut. Haruka’s father, not being a fisherman himself, had tried bringing home other fish from the market, but his wife was half-sick with hunger for the specific kind that sheltered under the hut where the boats would not go. In desperation, her father had set out with pole and line and sat on the rocks from sunup to sundown for three days, until at last he got a bite and hauled in a mackerel for his wife.

She cleaned and cooked the fish quickly, and devoured it gratefully, thanking him all the while. It seemed they might have peace while they awaited the birth of their child. But it was not to be, for that night a mighty storm rolled in, and with a clap of thunder, a booming came to their front door.

“THIEF!” shrieked a crackled old voice like burning straw, “THIEF! Come out and answer for your crime!”

In a dramatic confrontation, the old woman decried the man for having stolen fish from her private cove. Haruka’s mother, heavy with child, put herself between the old woman and her husband.

“I was the one who wanted the fish! Leave my husband alone!”

And with that, the old woman pointed a gnarled finger and Haruka’s mother felt a jolt in her abdomen as the curse hit her.

“Foolish woman,” the witch cried, “for your meddling, I have put a curse on your child. On her thirteenth birthday, this child will be stung by a jellyfish and die. She will have a longing for the sea, and nothing you do will keep her from it. You cannot protect her. Enjoy the time you have, for those years will fly by and before you know it her precious life will be snuffed out. You should think before you steal from the Demon Grandmother of Iwatobi!”

With that, she vanished in a clap of lightning.

For years, Haruka’s parents watched over their clever daughter as she grew, joy tainted with mourning for the life they knew would soon be cut short. When a new family came to the village, however, mother and children all with bright red hair, rumors circulated that the lady of the family was a magic worker: a fox-witch.

***

“Haruka,” said her mother, one bright day when Haruka was eleven years old, “please bring this basket of sweets to the new family in the village, and make sure that this note goes to the lady of the house. It’s very important.”

“Yes, mother,” said Haruka, and she whistled for Makkou and they made the walk together across the village to deliver the sweets.

“Who are you?” asked the curious little boy who came to the door when she knocked. Surprised, Haruka did not answer right away. Soon another voice came from inside.

“Gou-chan, get out of the way.”

“Don’t call me -chan!”

In place of the little boy, a girl about Haruka’s age opened the door. She had short hair as red as maple leaves, freckles across her nose like sand, and bright eyes that shone like jewels. Haruka stared openly.

“What?” The red-haired girl looked defensive.

“I’m sorry,” said Haruka, “I came to bring these for your mother. Can you make sure she gets the note? It’s very important.”

The girl took the basket, looking at it and its contents suspiciously. Then she noticed the little black dog that sat at Haruka’s heels, wagging its tail.

“Is that your dog?” she asked.

“Yes,” said Haruka, relieved. “Her name is Makkou. Do you want to come play?”

The girl looked inside over her shoulder, and then back at Haruka and shook her head, disappointment clear in her expression. “I can’t. I have to help my mother unpack her herbs today.”

“Well,” said Haruka, “would you like to come play tomorrow?”

The girl grinned. “Sure.” She reached out her hand. “My name is Rin.”

“Haruka.” Haruka shook Rin’s hand, a bit bemused by the gesture. “My family is Nanase. We live up on the hill by the shrine.”

“I heard about that shrine,” said Rin, nodding. “Powerful magic up there, right?”

“I don’t know,” said Haruka.

“Well,” said Rin, “maybe you wouldn’t know what to look for. But that’s okay, we can go explore and find out tomorrow.”

“Will you meet me at the shrine at noon? I can bring Makkou and pack a lunch.”

“Okay!” Rin flashed a grin, her teeth startlingly sharp. Haruka blinked, momentarily dazzled, and then nodded her head.

“See you tomorrow,” she began to say, but Rin was already closing the door.

“Thanks for the food,” she said, and latched it.

 _What odd manners_ , Haruka thought absently. _But what a beautiful girl._

She scratched Makkou behind the ears, and then trotted back towards her home.

Nanase Haruka was eleven years old, cursed to die at thirteen, but she did not know about that. What she did know was that she had just made a very remarkable new friend, and that tomorrow her new friend was going to teach her about magic. As far as Haruka was concerned, her life was looking up. And if she did not notice her parents checking up on her as she tossed and turned that night, too excited to sleep properly, she could have been forgiven.

Even in their worry, her parents had something new and precious in their own lives, a gift from the red-headed girl’s mother: hope. They, too, harbored a desperate excitement to see what the new day would bring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I gave Rin freckles and I'm not sorry about it.
> 
> jesus christ I've been writing a lot of curse fic.
> 
> I'm incorporating a lot of elements from Japanese mythos and fairy tales in this - please know that I encourage you to tell me if you notice I am being culturally fuckwitted or racist. This is a hastily thrown together thing and it's not unlikely I'll do something stupid, but I want to do my best to, you know, not.
> 
> Fairy tale gender roles are wacky, yo. I felt weird writing the parent stuff but like... rapunzel gonna punz. idk.


	2. Chapter 2

On the day of her thirteenth birthday, Nanase Haruka was stung by a jellyfish, and she died.

Except she didn’t die. Not actually.

There was a curse on her, placed when she was a baby in the womb, which meant she should die. It was all put in motion long before she was born: thirteenth birthday, jellyfish sting, death. The witch that cast the spell didn’t count on one important factor, however.

There was a new witch in town.

***

“What do you want to do for your birthday?”

Haruka looked up at the wispy clouds that slouched idly across the gray-blue of the sky, shifting her leg where Makkou’s wagging tail tickled it. “I want to go swimming,” she said.

Rin paused, propped up on her elbows on her stomach in the grass, pulling petals from a daisy. “I thought your parents said you couldn’t go swimming today.”

“They did.” Haruka sighed and flopped onto her stomach as well, shoulder-to-shoulder with the red-haired girl.

“Hmm.”

The two girls considered their options. Originally, Haruka’s parents had meant to stay with her for the entire day, watching over her in order to protect her from the curse’s magic. But a runaway cart had knocked her father over and broken his leg, and he was now in the care of the Widow Matsuoka, Rin’s mother, who tended to illnesses and injuries as well as to unlucky romances and failed crops. 

“Go with Haruka,” Rin’s mother had told her, pulling her aside quietly. “Her mother and father need to stay here while I tend to this injury, but Haruka must not be left alone today. Do you understand?”

Rin had nodded solemnly and gone outside to join Haruka, who was tugging at a stick in her dog’s mouth while she waited for her parents.

“Come on,” Rin told her, “we can go play while Mother fixes your father’s leg.”

The three of them had made their way to the meadow, and now Rin was deciding what to do next.

“First,” she announced, coming to a decision, “let me give you your birthday present.”

Haruka perked up at this suggestion and rose to sit cross-legged. Rin sat up as well and pulled a cloth-wrapped bundle from the pouch at her waist. “Careful with it,” she cautioned. “It’s fragile.”

Pulling open the blue-patterned folds, Haruka gasped softly. Rin tried not to look too pleased. From the cloth, Haruka pulled up a sand dollar, crocheted into a little net of red string, hung from a cord like a pendant.

“It’s for protection,” explained Rin. “The little stones in the netting are actually tiny pearls, I saved up for those. The symbols on the sand dollar are old magic. It’s to wear, it’ll keep you safe from -”

Rin was cut off by Haruka throwing her arms around her neck. Flabbergasted at the display of emotion from her stoic companion, Rin quite forgot what she had been saying.

“Thank you, Rin,” said Haruka into Rin’s hair. Rin blushed furiously.

“Of course!” she stammered. “It’s your thirteenth birthday! Thirteenth birthdays are very important in families like mine,” she added.

Haruka pulled back, sliding the cord over her head and pulling her hair out from under it. “Why, what do they mean?” She adjusted the pendant, admiring it from all angles.

“Well, for us, thirteen is when you start the rituals that bring you into adulthood. I’ll start training under my mother for real soon.”

The day was hot, and heat shimmered across the meadow through the sky’s haze. A bead of sweat ran down Haruka’s neck. Rin watched it go.

“If I were an adult, I’d be able to go swimming on my birthday,” said Haruka, looking up at the sky again, turning the sand dollar over in her fingers. She looked back at Rin. “This is for protection, right?”

“Yes,” said Rin. “Why?”

“Well,” said Haruka, getting to her feet, “if I’m protected, there’s no reason not to go to the ocean. Right?”

Rin felt there was a flaw to Haruka’s logic, but was having trouble placing it. “Well….”

“Who could possibly be better protection than you and Makkou?” said Haruka, petting the dog’s ears.

Rin blushed again, her ego satisfied. “You have a point there,” she said, standing up as well, and when Haruka challenged her to a race down to the water, she took off at a sprint.

A child’s sand dollar protection charm might not have been enough to fizzle a grown witch’s revenge curse entirely, but it was certainly enough to keep Haruka alive.

The girl did not die, but nor did she escape unscathed. The jellyfish’s sting caught her off-guard, and she cried out in pain before she collapsed into the waves, falling underwater. Rin raced to her and pulled her unconscious form out onto the wet sand, but nothing she tried would revive her. And then the old witch came.

“Fool!” hissed the witch, materializing on the shore, voice like metal sheets sliding down rocks. “You have meddled where you should not, child. Your charm has foiled my spell, but for your interference, I shall take your friend away forever!”

And in a trice, the witch vanished again, leaving Rin open-mouthed, staring into the space where she had been. When Rin looked back down in front of her, Makkou was there, pacing frantically, and there was an indentation in the sand like the side of a girl’s curled-up body, but Haruka was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I read through all of the bonus round rules over and over and nothing says you can't post multiple fills in the same narrative thread. SO, HERE WE GO.
> 
> someday maybe I will turn this into an actual story that is not garbage. I WANT IT TO BE GOOD BUT IT'S HAPPENING SO FAST.
> 
> I'm pretty sure the idea of the sand dollar necklace came from that Little Mermaid mer-haru/rin doujinshi that was so good my brain decided it was canon. whoops.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> chapter three has been cancelled due to some fuckups w.r.t. the rules of this bonus round
> 
> perhaps someday I will write this as an actual story, since I was excited about where it was headed
> 
> sorry y'all, the saso owns my ass at the moment
> 
> (this fill has been epically unpopular anyway so I don't feel too bad on anyone else's behalf)

[alas....]


End file.
